How Dare You Say That To Me
by x-backtoblack-x
Summary: Beca has a shocking revelation that Chloe didn't want to hear, especially not on her wedding day.
1. Chapter 1

"I'm sorry Chloe. I'm so sorry I just… I couldn't lie about it anymore." Beca cried, tears streaming down her face making her seem more vulnerable than Chloe had ever imagined she could be, though the red heads rage prevented her comforting the younger woman.

"Beca it's my wedding day. It's my god damn wedding day." Chloe spat, arms gesturing furiously as she stood in her bedroom, ready to go to the chapel in her ivory lace dress and up-do, having been called aside at the last minute by the brunette who was acting as one of her bridesmaids.

"I… I know." Beca whispered, almost unable to see the red head now through her tears. "And I don't… I don't expect anything from you… I just… I couldn't have you get married without saying it. I just… I love you." She sobbed, the last three words almost inaudible through her heaving breaths.

"Stop it! Stop saying it!" Chloe practically screamed, tears beginning to cloud her own vision as she sunk back into her bed.

"No I… no don't cry Chlo', please don't cry." Beca whispered, rushing to her friends side to try and comfort her, only to be shoved roughly away.

"Please… just please don't." Chloe whispered, her voice sounding broken. "I just… do you have any idea what you've done?" She hissed venomously.

"I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry." Beca cried, still lying on the floor where Chloe had pushed her. "I don't know why… I just had to say it." She tried desperately to explain.

"No. Stop it no." Chloe screeched. "Do you have any idea how much I loved you all through college." she began to admit in spite of herself. "Any idea how hard it was for me to forget you when you waltzed off to LA all of a sudden and left me? Any idea how hard I've tried to convince myself that I do love my fiancé? Any idea how much I've wanted to cheat on him since you casually strolled back into my life eight months ago? DO YOU?" She screamed, having risen off the bed to tower over Beca now.

"I…" Beca stammered, her mind having gone blank at Chloe's confession.

"You what Beca? You thought it'd be okay to simply admit that you're in love with me? I mean and then what? I suppose you figured we'd run off together, elope or some fucking shit like that and be happy forever more because you love me?" Chloe fought on, afraid if she stopped screaming she'd begin to break down completely.

"I don't know what I thought…" Beca admitted after what felt like a lifetime, the pair simply locked in a starting contest.

"Yea, that much is apparent." Chloe sneered, taking a step back and covering her face in her hands, sighing loudly. "I can't believe this." She mumbled through her fingers. "I can't fucking… AUBREY?" She screeched suddenly, the blond appearing within seconds, obviously having been listening, but too smart to let on she'd heard a thing.

"Yea?" She asked timidly, pretending not to notice her fellow bridesmaid lying on the floor beside an obviously frantic bride to be.

"Call it off." Chloe muttered, her voice seeming dead and broken. "Call the whole fucking thing off."

"Are you… are you sure?" Aubrey stammered, eyes going wide at her friends revelation.

"I need time to think. I need to figure all this shit out because I can't marry Brian when I'm not sure he's the person I should be with." She elaborated, seeming calm if it weren't for the sorrow in her tone.

"Your wish is my command." Aubrey told her slowly, walking briskly from the room, afraid she'd be given another job she didn't want to do if she stayed.

"Does this…" Beca started, being cut off quickly by the red head.

"Don't, just don't." Chloe snapped, holding up a silencing hand. "I need to think, and you need to leave… Just get out." She sighed falling back onto her bed again, grateful when the brunette got up and left silently, giving her time to think.


	2. Chapter 2

This wasn't how things were meant to be. This wasn't how her wedding day was supposed to go. In fact this wasn't how Chloe's life was supposed to turn out for her at all. Thirteen year old Chloe had it all planned out. Meet Mr Right – because at thirteen everyone knows that Prince Charming is merely an abstract concept but aren't quite clued in on Mr Right being one too – date him for a year to year and a half, have him propose to her in the middle of a fancy restaurant where everyone would stand up and cheer and she'd cry tears of joy and they'd hug, then after eight months of careful planning they'd be married and a year after that Chloe would have a husband, a child – hopefully a girl – a house with a white picket fence and maybe even a Labrador puppy. Everything she'd ever dreamed of.

She'd even managed to keep this dream pretty firm in her mind right the way through high school, never letting her boyfriend's break through that optimistic bubble, simply choosing to believe that they weren't the ones for her, with their muscle and terrible humour an lacklustre dates. Even in college although her faith dwindled at times she never gave up hope, having seen enough rom-coms to know that women like her were usually in their late twenties and in high powered jobs before they found true love.

Yes, Chloe had been so sure Mr Right would come along… until Ms Right did. Beca Mithcell sauntered into her life just as she was about to leave college and go in search of that quick paced city job and quirky, charming husband and had thrown her world on its head.

Beca Mitchell was everything Chloe was looking for in a person, and she knew it from the first second she'd laid eyes on her. She'd never been into girls before, not even so much as a girl crush – not that she wasn't open to it, it had just never happened for her – but it was as the French called it "_le flash_", love at first sight for Chloe as she watched the too cool to care freshman saunter across the quad, a half smirk hanging from her lips as she glanced at all the clubs she was far to image conscious to join.

Every moment from then had been reaffirmation that Chloe's first instincts were right, and that it was possible to simply see someone and know they were _the one_ so to speak. She quickly came to find that that lopsided grin seldom left Beca's face, the younger woman seeing humour in every aspect of life, and even if said humour was a little off the bat and inappropriate at times Chloe found it just made her more appealing, her jaded outlook on life forming a twisted kind of optimism not unlike Chloe's. Moreover she was elated to come to the realization that the girl did in fact sing, and that it would be this that inevitably drew them closer, long practice sessions, lots of team bonding and eventually some one on one bonding, though it was pushed off by Beca at first.

Yes, everyday Chloe found herself falling deeper and deeper in love with the small girl with the big voice and even bigger heart, though of course life and love have a funny way of teaming up and fucking you over sometimes, and that's exactly what happened to her.

The kiss between Beca and Jesse had been hard to miss and even harder to forget, though thankfully it was mere weeks before graduation, so compartmentalizing it hadn't proven too difficult once she'd stepped off that graduation stage and out the gates of the school to start her new life, adamant she'd forget about her old one here, and any collegiate crush she'd had on Beca Mitchell.

Doing so would have been harder if it weren't for her best friend. It had been Aubrey that'd drop kicked her back into the world of dating, setting up three consecutive dates for three consecutive weekends once they'd arrived in LA – and no, the going to LA thing wasn't Beca related, it had just been where Aubrey had gotten her internship and where she went Chloe knew she'd always follow.

It had taken a lot more than three dates – and even more tubs of Ben and Jerrys – but a year after moving there, and probably about three months after having finally let her thoughts of Beca almost never drift by she'd met Brian.

Brian was everything Chloe had needed at the time. He was kind, he was funny, he was compassionate, he was loyal and above all else, he treated Chloe like she was the only woman in the world that mattered to him, right from the offset. She found herself comparing him to Beca more than she should, but by this point the younger woman was a faded memory that e-mailed occasionally, so the comparisons gradually stopped being a bad habit and she came to accept him flaws and all.

She knew he probably wasn't _the one _but by this point she was also starting to forget what it felt like to know who that person was, and when he'd told her he loved her and she'd said it back out of instinct it hadn't even felt that foreign leaving her mouth so when he proposed a year and a half later she didn't really see why she should say no. He may not be the love of her life, but he was as close as she'd ever get to the Mr Right her high school self-had conjured up, so why not.

Well actually that "why not" had come barrelling into her life eight months before her wedding during a weekly wedding meeting held between her and Aubrey in a local diner – no prizes for guessing who's idea it had been to make it a weekly thing. Like literally Beca had come barrelling into her, having been knocked by some unruly teenagers and falling into Chloe's side both being half ways through unnecessary apologies when they realized who it was.

That move on Beca's part, though unintentional, had fucked Chloe over royally. It might have been fine if Beca was in LA on a visit, but no, she'd gotten a record deal and been allowed by her father to leave school a year early to pursue it meaning she was in town to stay, and meaning she was able to make herself good and comfortable in Chloe's life again. Apparently comfortable enough to admit her unyielding and irreversible love for her in fact.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

"_Chloe there's something I need to talk to you about." Beca had confessed quietly, Chloe not even having heard the younger woman come into the room as she'd been busy fixing her earrings._

"_What's up?" Chloe had asked her with an enthusiastic smile spreading on her lips as she turned, being mesmerised by the way her dress flared out ever so slightly at the bottom as she swayed._

"_Wow… you look… you look amazing Chlo'." Beca told her instead, having obviously lost her previous train of thought._

"_Thanks…" Chloe accepted the compliment with a soft blush. "Though what was it you wanted to say?" She asked, pressing forward with conversation, knowing she was running out of time to get all the photos she need before heading to the chapel._

"_I uh… you know what, it can wait." Beca told her suddenly, giving Chloe one last long look before turning and making her way for the bedroom door again._

"_No Beca, wait." Chloe reprimanded softly, striding across the floor in a few brief steps and grabbing the other woman's arm lightly, spinning her until they stood inches apart, looking one another in the eye._

_The move must have caught Beca off guard however, her eyes turning huge at their proximity and her jaw hanging loose for a moment before she finally got her wits about her and managed to speak again._

"_I… I think I'm in love with you."_

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Chloe still lay on the bed twenty minutes later, her mind still reeling; every sense receptor in her body going into turmoil as she was sure she was on the brink of tears or vomiting or a nervous breakdown of some description.

As fucked up as it was she knew now more than ever that she was in love with Beca. The emotions that had been reignited over the last eight months had turned into a full on inferno when the other girl had admitted her affections. It was Chloe's rage, then and now, however that had caused her unease. She was furious at Beca for having the audacity to say something like that to her on her wedding day, and she was even more furious at herself for considering it, for actually contemplating the option of leaving Brian, the man who was always there for her and always loyal to her.

She didn't know what to do. Clichéd and Hollywood as it was she was at a complete loss as to what she could do to make anything better at this point. Not only had she called off her entire wedding in a furious act of desperation, but she'd probably just scared both of the people that loved her out of her life for good.

She was sure she was imagining it when she heard the door open again, yet seconds later there was a dip in the bed beside her and a hand placed on her shoulder. She would have shouted and told whoever it was to get out, but the calming effect the simple touch had on her let her know instantly that it was her best friend, the one person she not only wanted to see right now, but _needed_ to see.

"I fucked up, didn't I?" Chloe sighed, not bothering to even open her eyes, which she was sure were sealed shut with tears at this point anyway.

"Little bit." Aubrey replied easily, having no problem being honest even now. "If it makes you feel any better I wasn't dumb enough to call of the wedding just because some crazy lady screamed at me." She added just as sombre, though Chloe knew that if she did open her eyes right now her friend would be smiling at her, so she did.

"But then… I still won't be there Bree." Chloe told her, looking her friend in the eye and dragging her body up in the bed until it as in a sitting position. "I'm… I'm not ready to face any of it. I can't have my wedding day be remembered like this, even if I do end up staying with Brain." She confessed, shaking her head when she realized no matter when or if she married Brian now, this would probably be all she'd remember regardless.

"So you really are considering this?" Aubrey sighed, having let her hand drop to Chloe's knee since the girl slid up in the bed, her eyes misty with pity at the sight of her best friend so confused and scared.

"I don't know." Chloe whispered; her voice cracking as she again began to contemplate every conceivable option. "I don't want to consider it but I have to. Beca was… Beca still could be the one Bree and I love Brian, I do, but when I see Beca it's like my senses are just a hundred times more alert. I can see every flicker of her eyelashes against her cheeks, I can hear her humming one of her mixes, I can smell the cherry shampoo she won't admit to using, and every time she as much as brushes shoulders with me it's as if she sets my skin on fire and I know that's dumb and I know that only happens in stupid generic rom-com films that are never half as messed up as my situation is right now, but that's just how I feel." She vented, her frustration flowing out of her in an avalanche of words.

"Well I can't tell you what to do…" Aubrey informed her softly. "I mean, I've never even sort of been in a situation like this before and I think unless someone has been they can't understand what it's like. I will tell you that you weren't wrong to listen to your heart and trying to call the whole thing off… I mean at the end of the day your heart's what'll be right." She tried to comfort, knowing that now was no time for pep talks and tough love as her friend crumbled before her.

"Yea well, that piece of crap organ doesn't really know what it wants right now." Chloe spat, feeling irrational anger towards herself and her best friend right now. "I mean with Brian I have stability and certainty and unwavering loyalty. With Beca I have… I have Beca." She concluded, letting out a sound that was somewhere between a scream and a frustrated sigh.

"Your choice… seems pretty clear to me." Aubrey tried to reason, knowing it wasn't as black and white as that, but also knowing her best friend even more than she knew herself.

"It's not though…" The red head mumbled. "It's not that simple because Beca's a flight risk. She had feelings for me in college too and she still kissed Jesse. She let herself fall out of my life for years before bumping into me by accident. She wasn't looking for me, or for this, it just happened to her… and as horrible as it sounds the reason Brian's such an obvious choice is because he loves me so much more than I love him… with him I'll be safe, with Beca I'll be sleeping with one eye open to make sure she's still in bed next to me."

"You have to make a choice." Aubrey told her, firm but gentle in her approach. "You go with your head or you go with your heart. Either way there'll be fallout, and either way I'm here, and you know that, but it's not me or your parents or your co-workers or your friends that are making this choice, it's you." She reminded unnecessarily.

"I need to go find them… and talk to them don't I?" Chloe breathed out suddenly as the colour drained from her face, realizing the mammoth task she was about to undertake. "Is Brian… is he still at the chapel?" She asked then, afraid that if Aubrey hadn't called off the wedding he'd probably be there waiting for her.

"No I… I uh, called him and gave him a quick rundown of what happened. Weddings not off but he did postpone it. He's uh… he's in the kitchen with Beca actually… it's a tense room." She explained, knowing now that leaving the two in the one room probably wasn't her greatest decision in life.

"Just so you know… if my head wasn't such a mess right now I'd be shouting at you for doing that." Chloe mumbled, jaw having fallen open when she imagined just how uncomfortable an atmosphere there'd be downstairs. "Right now I've bigger fish to fry though… I think I'm gonna be sick." She added as she got up shakily from the bed and stepped cautiously towards her bedroom door.

It was a tense room. Like hospital waiting room tense. Brian sat at the table, staring at a point somewhere in the distance, his eyes looking cold and empty rather than their usual twinkling gaze. Beca stood against a counter, poker straight and chewing relentlessly on her nails, her eyes darting about the room landing anywhere but on Brian. They both sprung to attention when Chloe walked in, followed closely by Aubrey, neither making any attempt to move towards the red head as if she were likely to burn them again.

"I messed up." Chloe confessed shakily upon entering the room, her voice cracking as she gazed upon the two people she loved most looking more scared now than she'd ever seen them and knowing it was her doing.

"What the hell's going on here Chloe?" Brian's voice was raw and uneven, almost as if he was recovering from a sore throat.

"I messed up." Chloe repeated again, tears building in her eyes. "I messed up because I fell in love with both of you." She tried to explain, balling her hands into fists as she once again was overcome with self-loathing.

"With… Beca? Me and Beca?" Brian questioned, dumbfounded by the revelation.

"With you and Beca." Chloe clarified. "I didn't mean to, I really didn't. I wanted to love you and be happy and live here with you for the rest of our lives and have three kids and a dog and retire together and move to somewhere warmer where our grandkids could visit… I really did." She confessed, the words spilling from her mouth only held up by the sobbing in between.

"Did?" Brian repeated, the word bouncing around the walls of the room like a bullet.

"Yea… did." Chloe whimpered, the use of the past tense having not been something she meant to do. "But I loved Beca from the very first second I saw her. I loved everything about her, even the things I should hate, but then she high tailed it out of my life and to preserve myself I moved on and found you and really, really thought I was happy… But wow did life fuck me over when Beca reappeared in it all over again by accident. I was really, really happy and then all by accident I wasn't sure of anything anymore and now I'm even less sure so I don't know what I want, because as much as I love Beca unconditionally I want to be with you." She confessed; ignoring the pained look on the brunettes face as her words sunk in.

"You really… that's really how you feel?" Brian asked, his expression stiff and lifeless. "That's… this is… you're serious?" He tried again, being unsure how to finish the sentence.

"God I don't know what I'm doing." Chloe cried in frustration, the pained look on her fiancé's face killing her a little. "This is wrong. I should be sure of this. I should know what I want and the decision should be easy, but it's not. I'm left second and third guessing myself and I hate myself for it, but it's not as easy as that." She raged, right now wishing that neither person existed in her life for the simple fact that things would be so much simpler.

"I'll make it simple." Beca spoke up suddenly, taking a tentative step forward. "I'm going. It was wrong what I did earlier. If I really loved you I'd be able to let you be happy with Brian." She explained.

"No Beca." Chloe whimpered in spite of herself, feeling a part of her break at the thought of losing the girl from her life for good. "Don't just walk out. Don't… don't let me lose you again." She begged before she could stop herself.

"No I… I can't Chloe." Beca shrugged, wiping a tear quickly from the side of her eye before picking up her bag, turning to walk towards the door.

"Beca stay." Brian commanded suddenly, having watched the exchange between the two women without as much as a sound. "I think I'm the only one that should leave now." He explained, Beca having frozen in her spot.

"Brian…" Chloe whispered, her eyes darting quickly from the petite brunette to the man beside her.

"See that right there Chloe… that's why I have to go." He stated firmly with a faint yet sad smile. "I could see it in your eyes and I could hear it in your voice when Beca was walking out. You were devastated at the thought of losing her. With me… well with me you just don't want my feelings to get hurt, and I respect that and I'm grateful, but I'm a grown up. I can look after myself." He let her know softly.

"But I…" Chloe tried to interject, only to be cut off.

"I'm an accountant Chloe. I'm nice, I'm pleasant, and I'm the kind of guy you bring home to meet your parents but that's not what you need in your life. You think it is but it isn't. You need someone that can excite you, someone that shares your passions and your dreams and that will actually sing with you when you burst into spontaneous song. Someone you can argue with all day long and still love them at the end of it. Someone that sets your soul on fire and make you feel alive and as much as it kills me to say it that's not me. It's her." He told her mournfully. "You've been so happy recently. I thought it was the wedding, but it wasn't. I really liked the idea that it was the thought of being with me for the rest of your life that made you come home in the evenings with a smile like that and I was so… overwhelmed that I could be the cause of such happiness in a person, but I wasn't. She was, and if I can't be the cause of the happiness in you I don't want to be the reason you're deprived of it. So this is it, this is me walking away because all I want is for you to be happy, even if it means losing you." He confessed with a sombre nod, backing slowly towards the door until suddenly he was gone, the room having remained silent as he left.

Chloe fell to the floor then. Not in an all too dramatic way, she just kind of slouched into a heap, her dress spewing out at alternate angles, a sea of ivory consuming the black tile around her.

"Everything's so… so fucked up." She sobbed, the cries heavy and soul destroying as she reached instantly for Aubreys hand, the blonde being at her side in seconds.

"You did the right thing. You did the right thing." Her best friend muttered continually in her ear, arms wrapped protectively around the red head.

"Beca." Chloe said then suddenly, as if only remembering the younger woman hadn't left.

"Yea…" Was Beca's meek reply as she hunkered close to the older woman, apprehensive about getting to close so she kept her distance.

"What is this?" She asked sadly, gesturing between them as she gradually made eye contact with the brunettes blue orbs.

"This… this is me loving you, and I think it's you loving me too and that can be everything or it can be nothing at all, it's completely up to you, you're just not allowed to decide yet because right now you're in no fit state to decide and you probably hate me almost as much as I hate me right now." Beca explained with some reservation, never having been good at wording herself well.

"No." Chloe choked out eventually, beginning to get her tears under control. "I don't… I can't hate you. That's the problem, I can't. I just need time to work this out." She added.

"Time… time I can give you, I swear." Beca promised with the faint hint of a smile on her lips.

"Tomorrow. You need to come back tomorrow and we need to talk." Chloe told her with a nod. "Right now I can't. I need to sleep and I need to cancel my wedding but tomorrow we need to talk." She planned.

"I'll be here at nine sharp." Beca informed her. "Though like you say, you have stuff to do now, so I'm going to go." She added, rising awkwardly, her dress hindering her movements.

She walked slowly to the door, glancing only once at Aubrey before she left, glad when she didn't see pure hatred in the fiercely protective woman's eyes – it was more a mix of hatred and sorrow which was something she could at least work with. She had her hand on the door knob before someone spoke again.

"Everything." Chloe whispered, looking expectantly at Beca until she turned around. "If my choice is nothing or everything… Everything." She clarified; her expression and tone never changing from the broken contorted sorrow.

"I was really hoping that's what it would be." Beca smiled, feeling yet more tears sting at the side of her eyes when she finally did walk outside into the brisk air.


End file.
